


But Hey, You're All Right

by inlovewithnight



Category: due South
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-16
Updated: 2009-11-16
Packaged: 2017-10-03 03:25:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inlovewithnight/pseuds/inlovewithnight





	But Hey, You're All Right

On Ray's 50th birthday, he has to talk Vecchio out of having a party.

It isn't that hard, actually; Vecchio's heart isn't really in it, and if Ray thinks about it for two minutes, he can tell why. Who the fuck would they _invite_? The 2-7 is like another planet these days from what it was in Vecchio's day, and Ray's hardly buddies with any of the alien life forms. They're a bunch of kids. Babies. Puppies.

"Okay," Vecchio says, shrugging, making the bare minimum of effort to look put-out about Ray shooting down his plan. "You don't want a party, Stanley, then we'll order a fuckin' pizza and watch the game like we do every other night. It's your birthday you're wrecking, not mine."

Ray rolls his eyes. "Not wrecking anything, Vecchio. And we don't have to sit around, we could go to the bar, we could go to the _game_. You got no imagination."

"Yeah, that's my problem," Vecchio says, in that flat tone of voice Ray always hears as _the fuck is wrong with you_, but not as mean as it might be, more like kind of fond exasperation.

If Ray thinks about _that_ for two minutes, it isn't weird either; they've known each other for a long time now--Christ, fourteen years. Partners for four, until Vecchio went and got himself shot again like the idiot he was. And then after his retirement, just...buddies. Friends. Best friends, maybe, if you had to put it like that.

And since then it's been a fucking _decade_, and the whole world's changed. Everything. Every-fucking-thing. Boston won a World Series, because there's no justice in the world. Vecchio and Frannie opened a _coffee shop_, of all crazy weirdass things. Ray bounced around the force like a ping-pong ball, hitting fraud and vice and arson and somehow ending up in internal, which he _never_ thought in a million years he would be able to stand (investigating other cops? He wasn't that kind of asshole) but it turns out he kind of likes. Three years in IA now. Fuck. And he's turning fifty.

He's getting fucking old.

But Vecchio's two years older than he is, and always will be, so at least he's got _that_ to hold on to.

"Earth to Kowalski," Vecchio says sharply, and Ray looks at him, flipping through his mental file of insults and picking the one closest to his current train of thought.

"What, old man?"

"I said do you seriously want tickets? Because I'll see what I can do."

That makes Ray blink, because yeah, Vecchio's his best friend but that doesn't mean they're _nice_ to each other. Then he remembers Vecchio's fiftieth, and how much moping and bitching and getting drunk on disgusting wine in Ray's living room with a _Terminator_ marathon on the TV had to happen, and he figures that maybe Vecchio is trying to balance out some karma or something.

"Let's just go to the bar," he says, shrugging like it's no big deal. "Why'd I want to spend my birthday dealing with a bunch of idiots at the stadium? We can watch it on the big screen."  
**  
So it's just the two of them, at the bar on the corner by Ray's apartment. Vecchio nurses one beer the whole night, because that's just the way he is. Ray maybe takes that as a little bit of a challenge, to keep their table's average up. Maybe he gets a little tanked. Don't matter. He has the day off tomorrow anyway.

He tells Vecchio about how he got a letter from Fraser that morning, naturally. Fraser has some kind of sixth sense for when to mail a letter from the middle of East Nowhere in the Canadian wilderness and have it arrive exactly on the day he intends. He's never missed a birthday for either of them, except the ones that fell on Sundays. Actually, he didn't miss those either, because he made sure the letter got there on the day before.

He tells Vecchio about it, about what's going on up in East Nowhere (neither of them understand any of it, except that Fraser's happy and surrounded by trees and what else do they need to know?), and Vecchio nods and makes vague interested noises and sips his beer every third or fourth batter.

"You okay?" Ray asks finally, rubbing his thumb against his jaw and killing his own drink.

Vecchio shrugs. "Yeah. You know me."

"Yeah, that's how I can tell something's bugging you." Ray rocks back on his stool and stares at Vecchio, who's a little blurry around the edges but at least there's still only one of him. "Spill it."

Vecchio takes another drink and looks at him. "Frannie asked me today if me and you were a thing."

Ray blinks and lets the stool thump back down onto all four feet. "A thing?"

"Yeah. Like a couple." Vecchio shrugs again and squints at the screen. "I told her no, and she asked why not, and then she talked about how long it's been since either of us dated anybody."

Ray frowns. "I go on dates."

"The last one was sixteen months ago. Frannie keeps a chart."

"She does?"

"Yeah, I don't know, she needs a hobby or something, I think I'm going to get her a cat." Vecchio glances at him and shrugs yet another time. "Anyway. So I was just thinking about that."

Ray's having a hard time sorting this all out in his head, and probably only half of that's because of the beer. "Thinking _what_ about it?"

"I don't know. Hey, asshole, that was a strike, come on, what are you, blind?"

"Stop paying attention to baseball and answer my question."

"I don't know, Kowalski, I guess I was just thinking about it in general. Why we haven't ever...been a thing."

Ray needs another beer. Unfortunately, the bartender is shunning them, probably because he yelled that thing about not paying attention to the game. "Because we both like _women_, Vecchio."

Vecchio rolls his eyes and takes another infinitesimal sip of his drink. "We're too old to fixate on that stuff anymore, Kowalski."

"This conversation's really confusing to me," Ray tells his empty bottle, then looks at Vecchio again. "So are you saying you _want_ to...be a thing?"

"I'm not saying anything," Vecchio says, giving him that look that Ray hates. "I was just thinking. And now I'm done thinking, and I'm gonna go take a piss."

While he's gone, Ray steals his beer and finishes the rest of it. It's room-temp and verging on stale. He doesn't care.

When Vecchio comes back, Ray's already paid the tab and is standing at the end of the bar, weaving a little on his feet. "We're going back to my place and settling this once and for all."

Vecchio doesn't ask what he means, even though based on what they said before he left, there wasn't anything to _settle_ anyway. Ray sort of jumped ahead to that part in his head while he was waiting.  
**  
By the time they get back to Kowalski's apartment, it's sort of started to sink in that he doesn't have a fucking _clue_ how this works. With a girl, yeah, he knows how to do that, there are _rules_ and _rituals_ and shit and even if they both think it's all kinda dumb, at least they can laugh together about that, and laughing leads to making out pretty smoothly.

He doesn't have the first idea of how to make a move on Vecchio. The whole idea doesn't even really make any _sense_.

Vecchio's standing by the couch, giving Ray that damn _look_, the kind of amused one, like he's not surprised at all but kinda thinks what's going on is funny. There's a word for it--_sardonic_. Yeah, that's Vecchio. Sardonic bastard.

Ray realizes he's bouncing a little, up on his toes, like he's still boxing or something. Maybe that's what Vecchio's laughing at. Ray drops down to his heels and sets his jaw, giving Vecchio a look of his own. "So, we gonna do this?"

"You know what, Kowalski..." Vecchio shakes his head slowly, running the flat of his hand over his head. "Let's just forget it, huh? It's no big deal. I was just running my mouth. Let's forget I ever said anything, and we can watch some TV, you can have a few more beers and celebrate your birthday by passing out on the couch. I'll dump you into bed and get home by midnight. Sound like a plan?"

"That plan sucks."

"All right." Vecchio rolls his eyes and shoves his hands into his pockets. "You're feeling a little feisty, I take it. We don't have to stick around here. Let's go down to that club, the one that rock star owns. You know, the guy you hate."

"Which one?" Ray asks sulkily. "I hate a lot of people."

Vecchio grins. "Yeah, you do. You compulsively read every stupid celebrity tabloid, and then you yell about how much you hate them. But I'm talking about the one with the stupid hair and the tattoos and the big teeth."

"Oh, yeah, him." Ray nods, narrowing his eyes. "I really hate him. What are we gonna do at his club?"

"Aw, you know." Vecchio boosts himself up onto the back of the couch, swinging his feet slowly. "We'll bust 'em for selling to minors, pull their license, make that guy fly back here from LA and show up in court to get it back. It'll be fun."

Kowalski considers it for a minute, rocking back on his heels. He does like fucking with people who are full of themselves, and that club is packed to the ceiling with them. Annoying snotty people would make for a pretty great birthday. Plus he might get to give a statement to US Weekly about it.

He snaps his fingers and points at Vecchio. "You're just trying to distract me."

Vecchio sighs, kicking the back of the couch. "Look, I'm not going to try to get you to do anything you don't want to do."

"Who says I don't want to do it?"

"The look on your face, Kowalski."

"Forget the look on my face. I want to do this. Let's do this."

Vecchio has that look again, turned up to eleven now, like Ray's just the most ridiculous thing he's ever seen. "I'm not stopping you."

Ray throws his hands in the air, which makes the room spin a little. That'll teach him to drink decent beer. "This isn't weird to you at all? I mean, just deciding out of nowhere that hey, maybe you'll try being gay, after fifty fucking years?"

"Kowalski." Ray expects him to say something nasty, or to get up and start pacing around or something, but Vecchio just looks down at the floor and runs his hands along the back of the couch, slowly, back and forth. "You know, I just don't think it's that...simple, for us."

"Us?"

"For me." Vecchio shrugs, his fingers still worrying at the couch and his eyes fixed firmly on the floor. "How long have we been buddies now, you know? I think you've been in my life longer than anybody who isn't my family. You've known me a long damn time. You've...stuck around. I trust you."

The way Vecchio's talking, the little stops and hesitations, Ray feels all of them in his chest. "Yeah. I trust you, too, Vecchio."

"So, you know. When you've got a...a best friend, and you've known each other a long time, and you trust them, you start...you can start thinking about the stuff you don't let yourself think about with other people. The stuff you don't have time to figure out, or you know nobody else wants to hear about, the stuff that's just too...much."

Ray thinks maybe he stops breathing for a minute. "It's not too much with me."

Vecchio shakes his head, still looking at the floor. "Maybe I'm a little buzzed. I'm talking crazy. I should go home. We can bust that club another night."

"Vecchio," Ray says firmly, and Vecchio almost looks up. "You had one beer. Even a Sox fan is not that much of a pussy."

That does make Vecchio look up, a flash of real annoyance in his eyes. That's better, that's something Ray knows how to roll with. "You been thinking about this for a while?"

"I run a coffee shop, Stanley, I have a lot of goddamn time on my hands for thinking, okay?" Vecchio glares at him, and Ray grins. Yes, this, he _definitely_ knows how to roll with this.

"I'm not so big on thinking," he says, moving toward Vecchio. "But now that you put the idea in my head, I kinda get what you mean. I'll have to kick this around a little. See what I come up with."

"Whatever." Vecchio's looking at him a little warily as he moves closer, his body tensing to stay balanced on the edge of the couch. "I wouldn't want you to strain your brain or anything."

"Zip it." Ray ends up standing between Vecchio's knees, bracing his hands on the back of the couch on the outside of Vecchio's own. "You put the idea in my head. Once I've got something in there, I've gotta try it out, you know?"

"Kowalski..."

Ray kisses him, and it turns out Vecchio had a pretty good idea after all, and some of that stuff Vecchio had said about things you didn't let yourself think about...maybe that made a little more sense. Part of Ray wishes somebody'd given him the idea to think about the stuff he wasn't supposed to think about a long time ago.

The rest of him is just kissing the hell out of Vecchio, and liking it a lot.

Vecchio's hands release the edge of the couch and find Ray's arms, sliding up and down them slowly, awkwardly. Ray knows that's how this whole thing is going to be--slow, awkward--it has to be, because neither of them knows what the fuck they're doing, really. They know all of the pieces, in theory at least, but not how they fit together.

"What do we do now?" Vecchio asks, his voice rough and throaty in a way that makes Ray's knees shake a little.

"I dunno." Ray kisses him again, liking how Vecchio's skin feels kind of rough against his own. It's new, different. Exciting. Ray hasn't stumbled across new and exciting for a while now. "Could...go to the bedroom, I guess? Or sit on the couch right."

"Like teenagers?" Vecchio laughs and drops his hands away from Ray's arms. "We're not teenagers, Kowalski."

"No shit," Ray says, rolling his eyes. "Believe me, I have a mirror. And a bill from my doctor for a colonoscopy."

"You have completely fucking killed the mood," Vecchio informs him, sliding off the couch and heading toward the kitchen. "Do you have any coffee?"

Ray watches him go, kicking himself for losing the moment, then squares his shoulders and follows. Fuck that. It's his birthday, and apparently he's missed a hell of a lot of time already in the last fourteen years. No more.

"Folger's, Stanley? Are you kidding me with this?" Vecchio's standing in front of his pantry, waving both hands around. "How has nobody thrown you in the river yet, I swear to--"

Ray grabs him from behind, turns him around roughly and pins him up against the pantry shelves and then kisses him again, hard and rough and this time he's not leaving any wiggle room for Vecchio to break away. "No takebacks," he says against Vecchio's mouth. "You can't say that and then take it back. That's...once that's out there, it's out there, got it?"

"Yeah." Vecchio nods, and Ray catches his breath because all of a sudden Vecchio's hands are on him, undoing his jeans, and if they don't suddenly get a lot more careful in the next two minutes, every shelf in the pantry is coming down on their heads.

They avoid that, barely, but Ray does lose a jar of olives. Olives for orgasms, it's a fair trade.

Vecchio pushes him back, not roughly but just like he needs to catch his breath. Ray understands the feeling.

"Well," Vecchio says, rubbing the back of his hand over his mouth. "No takebacks."

"No." Ray nods, not quite looking at him, and moves over to the sink. He zips up his jeans again, blinking out the window at the view of the street, and starts running the water. He doesn't even have a glass handy.

"Should get some sleep," Vecchio says, and Ray looks at him in the window instead of turning his head, because he has no idea what the fuck that's supposed to mean. Vecchio's leaving? He wants to sleep _with_ Ray? It's all ambiguous and it is way too early in the goddamn morning for ambiguous.

"Okay," he says cautiously, and Vecchio rolls his eyes.

"Blankets still in the same place as last time?" he asks, moving away from the pantry. "I know your couch is still just as crappy."

"The couch, huh," Ray says, keeping his voice neutral, and Vecchio stops.

"Don't get all emotional on me, Kowalski," he says, pointing at him. "I bet you ten bucks that you kick all night, and there's no way I'm putting up with that shit."

Ray scowls at him, but he can't really argue with that.

Vecchio's expression softens a little. "Look, we'll go to the diner tomorrow. Get pancakes. Figure out...whatever. Figure out what the takeback situation looks like in the daylight."

"No takebacks," Ray says again, folding his arms over his chest. Vecchio puts his hands up in surrender.

"Fine. Happy birthday, Kowalski, you get an old Italian and some olive juice on your floor."

Ray looks down, then up, and smiles. "Works for me."


End file.
